US Congress Considers Orphan Works Act

Start sending in those letters

Published on July 8, 2008 By Zoomba In WinCustomize News

Departing from our normally cheery news of cool skins, neat programs and new releases, today I wanted to share with everyone some news that could have a very significant impact on copyright law in the United States, specifically in the area of reusing work by other artists. The US Orphan Works Act of 2008 has two very important aspects that every skinner or digital artist should take heed of:

Artists will need to register their works with an entity designated by the US Copyright Office. This is a reversal of current passive copyright policy where you hold the copyright to a work automatically by virtue of creating it.
Infringement is allowed if the infringer claims that they made a reasonable effort to contact the author of the work. The infringer determines what is a reasonable and diligent effort.

This bill places the entire burden of protecting work and declaring copyright on the artist, and grants wide rights to those who infringe and reuse others art. Even in a case where the original author has registered, and the infringer is shown to not have made a reasonable effort, there is very little allowed under the bill to seek compensation or damages. Your skins here, if not registered with a designated database, could be taken and reused without notice or consent, and as artists you would have virtually no recourse.

I know copyright is very important to many people here, and that's why I wanted to pass this information along to everyone.

For a good summary on the bill currently before the US House of Representatives, go here.

To write to your representative/senator on this issue, go here.

Comments (Page 1)

Jafo

on Jul 08, 2008

It'll fail...simply because the USA does not live in a vacuum.

Someone will remind these idiot senators that the world does NOT revolve around their arses...and property [copyright] is owned by more than just people in the US.

Someone 'over there' tries to take my works and I'll personally have his balls, no matter what these senatorial miopeans think.

Libel Laws have already been successfully tested off-site [intercontinental] via the Internet....so there won't be any difference with copyright laws...

LightStar

on Jul 08, 2008

Must be a real idiot to have even started a ridiculous bill like this anyway. We are better off the way things the way they are right now than to have something like this in effect. I imagine the only reason it was introduced is because there will be a fee for filing with the US Copyright Office. Typical government, always finding a way to make a buck and make the public suffer. Why don't they do something more useful like take measures to control the price of oil. This is ludicrous!

LightStar

on Jul 08, 2008

Awwww, and I was trying to make the first comment Jafo...

My State Representatives have now heard from me!

Ausvet

on Jul 08, 2008

Seems to me that the US artists who do not file actively if this succeeds will lose all rights by allowing their work to be stolen and pirated by those outside the US jurisdiction. The laws intent goes from one of protecting the creator of intellectual and/or creative content to merely being a government income generator to try help lessen national debt.

messiah1

on Jul 08, 2008

I've been following this closely (as has my artist wife) and have written multiple letters so far. The more folks that know about this and take action the better.

SirBedwyr

on Jul 08, 2008

I'd think the better action would be to reform fair use, restrict copyright time for corporate and individual entities to death +50*, and rewrite the reverse-engineering parts of the DCMA. As for this, what are the arguments *for* the bill? (without resorting to political words like "corporate fat cats" or "those darn goobers" or "that darn so-and-so"). *The Mickey Mouse Act.

SirBedwyr

on Jul 08, 2008

From Lawrence Lessig who argued the extension case. Relevant to this conversation: "Patent holders have to pay a fee every few years to maintain their patents. The same principle could be applied to copyright. Imagine requiring copyright holders to pay a tax 50 years after a work was published. The tax should be very small, maybe $50 a work. And when the tax was paid, the government would record that fact, including the name of the copyright holder paying the tax. That way artists and others who want to use a work would continue to have an easy way to identify the current copyright owner. But if a copyright owner fails to pay the tax for three years in a row, then the work will enter the public domain. Anyone would then be free to build upon and cultivate that part of our culture as he sees fit."

Philly0381

on Jul 08, 2008

See what happens when a bunch of power hunger, underworked, oversexed, unsupervised people are left alone without getting their proper nap time.

And yet no one ever answers my one simple question. When did being a politician become a career choice? For god sakes, get these people doing a real job.

nicksick

on Jul 08, 2008

I think this is fantastic. Finally the artists have to do something, or its fair. You lose a wallet, you put up fliers. You lose a puppy or kitty, put up fliers. You want people to pay for your songs, register with this. Granted, I came in here expecting some law designating a home for orphaned children who paint and whatever very well. This is almost as good.

teddybearcholla

on Jul 08, 2008

Good post here on the front page Zoomba....as you know other people have written about the Orphan Works Act in the forums...this will stay visible longer.

The tax should be very small, maybe $50 a work.

Thinking of my gallery at DeviantArt, I have over 1,000 images...this would be quite a chunk of money to coyright each piece, and would be way beyond my means...

messiah1

on Jul 08, 2008

Really? You can't be serious. You must be trolling.

WebGizmos

on Jul 08, 2008

Only in America. Uninformed desk jockey's writing ridiculous laws.
What we need in this country is to get rid of all these old cronies in government wearing colostomy bags that have one foot in the grave and no stake in the future and replace them with younger people that have a clue and care about and understand the present day and have a stake in the future. Until that happens we will be stuck with one outdated law after another that seem to protect criminals more than anything.

Zoomba

on Jul 08, 2008

Have you ever actually created anything yourself? Written anything, drawn anything, designed anything? It's hard to understand the impact of this unless you yourself have work that would be impacted.

Also, your analogy doesn't work at all, in any way. Loss of a physical good is completely different from having IP taken. Someone could take a piece of art, and copy it, redistribute it, sell it without the original author ever knowing. A cat or a wallet is one single item that can not be copied. If my cat goes missing, I would notice because the cat would no longer be in my possession.

Forcing artists to register everything they ever create actually creates a chilling effect on creativity. It also hurts sites like WinCustomize because not only will artists have to upload here, but to some IP database too. After a point creators will have to look at the additional effort and ask if it's worth it. Also, with the law as outlined, an infringer can just say they tried to contact the author (even if they did not) and they're essentially in the clear. The entire law looks to place the artist at such a significant disadvantage that it would actively discourage artists from creating and posting anything at all.

ZubaZ

on Jul 08, 2008

It also hurts sites like WinCustomize because not only will artists have to upload here, but to some IP database too.

I wonder what kind of database the works would have to be uploaded to? In a imperfect world, there would be an API to allow uploads from 3rd party sites. So you could upload here and it would migrate to the authorized database.

In a perfect world this bill would never pass. How many CongressCritters are artists though? Why would they care? Something like this only helps the large publishing houses that can afford to "protect" rtheir clietns.

HG_Eliminator

on Jul 08, 2008

not sure since I havent gotten the chance to read it all but does this pertain to all forms of Digital art? music is an art, this will definately put a crimp on DRM and such by the music industry if so...

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